Results tagged “newmindspace”

                                        

Pillows and, yes, despite requests from organizers, feathers flew on Saturday as Newmindspace attracted several hundred people to Yonge-Dundas Square for their annual pillow fight. The good-natured battle started with an intensity and energy that only abated when the first feathered pillow burst, an eruption that was met with a sigh that rose quickly to a cheer. At the end of the event, the square's security personnel fretted about the amount of down covering the concrete, but plenty of volunteers stayed behind to help clean up.

FUN: Newmindspace is hosting another edition of their popular urban pillow fights this afternoon in Dundas Square. Participants are asked to arrive at 3 p.m. with a soft pillow in tow; feathers are no longer "green." The free, all-ages event will take place rain or shine, and will run until the sun sets. For rules and more information, check out the Facebook event. Dundas Square (40 Dundas Street West), 3 p.m., FREE.

THWMP. You’ve been hit. You dodged, but the pillow still caught you square between the shoulders. THWMPTHWMPTHWMMMMP. More dodging, more ducking, but you somehow found yourself sandwiched between a man wearing a bunny costume and your flatmate—who’s still mad at you for burning the rest of the Wheat Thins in the toaster oven. Game over. An explosion of white. Feathers flying, Bunny Man running, flatmate forgiving you with each downy friend you pluck from the corner of your mouth. PFFFFTTHHHHPP. Feathers. Everywhere.

    

Following on from previous light-based-fun installations, Newmindspace set out on Saturday night to attach enough coloured LED lights onto fishing wire, suspended by helium-filled balloons, to reach higher than the CN Tower, over 1800 feet. About halfway to the goal, however, the wire snapped in half, sending several hundred lights soaring off into the night sky, trailing behind a cluster of white balloons. The rest of the lights snaked harmlessly down to earth on the King's College Circle lawn.

ART: Pattie Boyd inspired both George Harrison and Eric Clapton to write their best-known songs while she was a part of their lives. She will be sharing a number of photographs taken during that London period at the exhibit "Through the Eye of a Muse." The exhibit (on until December 31) includes work that Boyd—now a member of the Royal Photographic Society—has done since that time. The Great Hall Gallery (1087 Queen Street West), 12–6 p.m., FREE.

                            

Last Saturday night the normally oh-so-sober Financial District came alive to Newmindspace's latest interactive urban adventure, a game of Capture the Flag. Approximately 1700 people gathered at the corner of King and Bay to hear the rules, grab their glow sticks (the teams were orange or green), and mingle before dispersing to plant their flags and plan their strategies. After more than two hours of running, skating, biking, and tagging the green team emerged victorious and everyone gathered again to swap stories, commiserate, and try their hand at virtual graffiti.

SPORTS: If you're wandering around the Financial District tonight, don't be too shocked when you see hundreds of people running around erratically. It's got nothing to do with the economic crisis; it's Newmindspace's Capture the Flag, back for its sixth episode, where the only crisis participants face is determining the whereabouts of their opponents' flag. Full details, the official map, and rules are available here. King Street and Bay Street (on the southwest corner), 9 p.m., FREE.

to be free...

PARADE: The 41st annual Caribana Parade runs along Lakeshore Boulevard today, starting at Exhibition Place and moving west. This year's celebration—like years past—will include Jamaican reggae bands, Latin salsa, Haitian zouk, and other music of the Caribbean, alongside colourfully-dressed dancers and other performers. And there will also be lots and lots of delicious Caribbean food. Exhibition Place (200 Princes' Boulevard), 10 a.m., FREE (unless you want to sit in the seated areas, where tickets are $25).

                                          

Bubbles flew at the Harbourfront Center this past weekend as kids of all ages took part in Newmindspace's annual bubble battle.

This Saturday, June 14th, as part of Luminat'eau, join those crazy kids and Newmindspace for their annual bubble battle. The event is loosely based on the Dr. Seuss classic The Butter Battle Book, where each warring faction (butter side up and butter side down) brings larger and crazier contraptions to the wall that divides their nations until their mutual destruction is assured.

A few months ago, over thirty cities participated in the inaugural International Pillow Fight Day, the first coordinated event by the decentralized network known as "the urban playground movement." The March 22 date, however, left out some of the world's colder cities.

In 1961, cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first person to visit space in his ship Vostok 1. Flying high above our blue planet, he remarked, "Circling the earth in my orbital spaceship I marvelled at its beauty. People of the world, let us safeguard and enhance this beauty, not destroy it!"

If anybody remembers last year's Snow Day, an ill-fated attempt to make snow in Trinity-Bellwoods Park with a defective snowmaker that lead to a giant snowball fight, you may be pleased to learn that exactly one year later, there is actually a bunch of snow on the ground, and the plan is the same. It seems the lesson about controlling Mother Nature has been learned, and our collective prayers have been answered.

Feeling S.A.D.? Toronto's Christmas spirit wore off weeks ago and waiting outside for the streetcar has become more face-numbing than going to the dentist.

It seems there is a sort of subtle resentment for pants growing in popular culture. Although Improv Everywhere has been organizing their annual No Pants Subway Ride in New York for seven years, only recently has the tradition really taken hold in cities around the world.

Andy Warhol's Factory parties were the ultimate hot spot for an elite cabal of celebrities, radicals, drag queens and porn stars. There has never been a better place to rock out while on an amphetamine high amid mass-produced silkscreen paintings and a fleet of floating silver balloons.

While Newmindspace have organized subway parties in Toronto, SkyTrain parties in Vancouver, and métro parties in Montréal, sometimes nothing beats an old-fashioned streetcar party for a beat-bumping, track-turning, three hour party tour of the city. The TTC will rent a streetcar (PCC, CLRV or ALRV) for a minimum of three hours for a pretty steep fee to just about anybody. The customer can request a custom route, like Newmindspace has, that takes advantage of...

Every weekday morning, bright and early, we feature a photo (or two) from a photographer in the Torontoist Flickr Pool. It's our way of giving the many excellent photographers in our pool the attention that they deserve. Punk Politico BY DZGNBOY...

Photo by End User from the Torontoist Flickr Pool Last night, under the futuristic angles of the Royal Ontario Museum Crystal, over 2000 people gathered to do battle with glowing cardboard tubes in an epic lightsaber battle organized by Newmindspace. The evening was a huge success, attracting hundreds of curious, incredulous or plain baffled onlookers. More images after the jump....

Friday night saw some 1600 people (according to glowstick consumption) running through downtown Toronto looking for pink and blue flags, having a generally awesome time for Newmindspace's Capture the Flag event. In the end, the Blue team emerged victorious!

Earlier this afternoon, an army of pillow-wielders (and camera-wielders) descended on Nathan Phillips Square to take part in Newmindspace's hopefully-annual pillow fight.

Our own very Kevin Bracken, co-founder of newmindspace with Lori Kufner, just posted this video online today of the massive game of Capture the Flag that they organized at the end of September. 1,200 people showed up, which, at last count, is quite a lot. And hey, remember when it was warm enough to be outside with slivers of exposed flesh? Good times. Check it out:

Tomorrow night, hundreds will gather to throw 1,000 colourful, magnetic points of light. Newmindspace presents Radical Illumination, Toronto's introduction to these delightful street art devices, throwies.

Blaring horns, bicycle bells, glowing necklaces, screeching tires, and hundreds of Torontonians sprinting through the Financial District yelling, "Incoming!" These are the sights and sounds one can expect from Newmindspace's latest installation of everybody's favourite childhood game, Capture the Flag. The game has been liberated from its grassy prison and placed squarely in the "business ghetto" grid. Participants will use five subway stations, two streetcar lines, a bus, the PATH network, bicycles, longboards, scooters...

If there's one thing that you don't expect to see on a Friday evening in downtown Toronto, it's a chartered streetcar full of fully-costumed pirates rolling along University Avenue in an event organized as a fundraiser for an "Imaginarium." Yar?!

Newmindspace specializes in throwing irreverent, collective urban events. What qualifies as irreverent in a city as quirky as Toronto? How about a giant easter egg hunt, giant game of urban capture the flag, giant subway (and streetcar) parties, and giant pillow fights? No matter what they're doing, the focus is on getting people - lots of people - together to do something cool, unusual, and fun.